Endocrine Abstracts

In acromegaly, treatment with somatostatin analogs (SSA) normalizes growth hormone (GH) and insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF1) secretion in about half of the patients. Usually, the disease relapses biochemically within few months after treatment withdrawal.We present two acromegalic patients, women of 49 and 53 years at diagnosis, respectively, who achieved stable remission of the disease after medical treatment withdrawal. One had a microadenoma, the o...

Introduction: Endogenous Cushing’s syndrome (CS) is a rare disease associated with severe morbidity and increased mortality if untreated. Glucose metabolism is significantly altered in hypercortisolism.Objective: To retrospectively analyse the clinical presentation of a cohort of patients with endogenous CS and study the frequency of glucose metabolism abnormalities as opposed to other clinical signs and symptoms.Material and ...

Introduction: Successful parathyroid surgery in patients with OFC leads to early and marked improvements in BMD but data on very early changes in bone markers are missing.Case report: A 20-year-old girl was hospitalised because of severe bone pains and multiple pathological fractures (left humerus and left proximal femur) after minimal trauma. She had lost weight, was amenorrhoeic for the last 12 months and was bleeding from brown tumours in her mouth. S...

Objective: To determine if the response to one single dose of 0.5 mg cabergoline (CAB) can be used as predictor for choosing personalized therapy of hyperprolactinaemia. Although CAB is a selective, long half-life D2-receptor agonist some patients proved to be resistant with minimum to no response in serum prolactin and tumour shrinkage, even after a few months of treatment.Patients and methods: A dose of 0.5 mg CAB was administered orally to a number of...

Introduction: Complete long-term clinical remission in occult ectopic ACTH syndrome after a single adrenalectomy is unexpected.Case report: 5 year ago, a 54-year-old man was admitted because of resistant HTA, multiple severe vertebral fractures, muscle weakness and cushingoid features of at least 1 year. Adrenal tests were diagnostic of ACTH-dependent Cushing’syndrome: ACTH=263 pg/ml, high plasma (62 μg/dl) and urinary free cortisol (UFC=1256 &...

Introduction: Pituitary apoplexy is a rare syndrome due to hemorrhagic infarction of a pituitary adenoma. It may be clinically overt (sudden, severe headache, visual disturbances, impairment in pituitary function, and altered consciousness), or subclinical. Pregnancy is a rare predisposing factor, which may raise difficulties in the diagnosis and treatment.Case presentation: A 25 years woman diagnosed with a 1/0.8 cm prolactinoma, initial serum PRL 61.5 ...

Adrenal cortical carcinoma is a rare disease with an incidence of 1–2/million per year. Diagnosis is related to autonomy of adrenal steroid synthesis, tumour size above 6 cm, local invasion and tendency to recurrence. Treatment consists in adrenal surgery, non-specific chemotherapy and radiotherapy, and, more specific-Mitotane (Lysodren).Pathology diagnosis is based on capsular and vascular invasion, histological changes suggestive for malignancy an...

Introduction: Histiocytosis X is a rare disease involving clonal proliferation of Langerhans cells, abnormal cells deriving from bone marrow and capable of migrating from skin to lymph nodes. Its manifestations range from isolated bone lesions to multisystem disease. Seen mostly in children, multifocal histiocytosis may involve in 50% of cases the pituitary stalk, leading to diabetes insipidus and usually permanent pituitary deficiencies. We present an adult patient with a com...

Introduction: Iron deficiency contributes to stabilization of HIF1α and upregulation of genes that stimulate angiogenesis in diseases associated with oxidative stress. The authors’ interest is centered on evaluation of the relation between iron status and angiogenesis (VEGF-A, sVEGFR) in patients with melanoma.Methods: The study included 128 patients with melanoma before surgical removal of the tumor. We determined ferritin (immunoturbidimetric...

Introduction: Pituitary apoplexy is a rare acute complication in patients with functioning pituitary adenomas (including acromegaly) often followed by hypopituitarism and occasionally may show remission of symptoms after an apoplectic episode. We report this in an acromegalic patient who developed remission following pituitary apoplexy.Case report: A 24 years old woman is diagnosed with acromegaly after presenting for a period of 6 months moderate headac...